


Never Ever Been a Calm Blue Sea

by Magnetism_bind



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Emotions, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Longing, M/M, Multi, Mutual Pining, Pining, Polyamory, Storms, missing people
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:47:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25272661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magnetism_bind/pseuds/Magnetism_bind
Summary: Time passes but the longing never ends.
Relationships: Miranda Barlow/Captain Flint | James McGraw/Thomas Hamilton
Comments: 4
Kudos: 20





	Never Ever Been a Calm Blue Sea

_At sea 1705 – James_

The ship lurched again and the inkpot tilted, sending a scattering of spots and blotches across the letter he’d been writing.

“Damn and hell.” James snatched the page away angrily but it was already smeared. He sat there staring at it as if hoping the words would become legible once more but the hope was futile. At last he gave up, crumpling the paper in his fist.

It was just as well, he supposed. The words had been nothing but sentimental drivel anyway. There was no true point in writing it because he would be back in London again most likely before the letter even had a chance to reach them.

Still all the same, he wished it could just magically arrive at the Hamilton house in London and be waiting on that tray in the hallway for their breakfast tomorrow morning. He imagined the look of delight on Miranda’s face as she examined the envelope and saw his handwriting. “It’s from the lieutenant.” She would say. _From James_ , she would say if they were alone.

Thomas would look up from his tea. “Really? What does he say?”

There the picture stalled for as much as James could imagine further, he didn’t want to. He wanted to be there with them in that room, enjoying their company and waiting for the inevitable moment when the servants would leave the room and they could be alone.

He sighed and rose from the desk, going over to where the lantern hung from the wooden beam. He opened the glass door and set the crumpled page to the flame, watching it spread across the paper immediately. Truly there was no point in writing. They had stopped briefly in Charlestown per the admiral’s instructions before heading to Nassau to assess the situation before they would finally return to England with whatever news they would bring. 

_It had to be good news_ , James thought fervently. _And yet what if it wasn’t?_ He so desperately wanted Thomas to succeed in his plan. Whatever it took, it must happen.

The ship rolled again and he steadied himself. Casting a look at his bunkmate, a fellow midshipman, who was somehow able to sleep through this, James reached for his coat and hat and went up on deck.

Slowly he made his way across the rain slicked deck to the railing. The waves tossed and roiled, the ship swaying back and forth upon them like a marionette. He clutched the railing and stared out over the waves towards home. It was agonizing and yet it was his duty to be here, no matter the personal cost. He wouldn’t have it any other way. What good would he be to Thomas and Miranda if he held no position, had nothing to offer them? This was the best way that he could aid them, and yet his heart ached every day he was gone from them.

 _Nearly two months_ , James thought. _How much longer will we be here? How much longer till I can return to them? How long till I can kiss them again?_

He gave a sigh that was lost in the howl of the wind and finally turned back to go below deck once more. 

* * *

_Nassau 1706 - Miranda_

The rooster woke her before dawn. For a moment Miranda lay there in bed, unsure of where she was, and then it came back to her. The life she knew before in London was gone. This cottage, this island, they were all that was left now.

 _For now_ , she told herself as she rose from the bed and started to dress.

It had been over a year since James and she had fled London in disgrace. A long, terrible year but as time passed Miranda had begun to think perhaps they could move forwards with their lives. They had made a semblance of a life here without Thomas but already she knew it was not enough.

_Thomas._

She felt the familiar pain in her chest. Some days she could hardly face saying his name, and others she forced herself to think of him, to remember him, to give herself a reason for going on. Thomas wouldn’t want her to waste her life hiding away from the world. He would think that cowardly.

As she put the kettle over the fire in the kitchen she couldn’t help wondering what he would think of James. Or rather, Flint, as he went by now. What Thomas make of him?

The stories of Captain Flint were spreading throughout Nassau and beyond. Even Miranda had heard them now. At first it almost had been difficult not to laugh at them, for it was hard to picture the fierce pirate captain in the tales as her James. But then she thought of the time that he had come to the house once, blood still staining his shirt though he had tried to hide it, and the way he pulled his hand away when she tried to reach for it, only to reveal his bruised and swollen knuckles. There was violence in him; Miranda had always known that. It hadn’t worried her then. And now, she was almost jealous of it. She was allowed no such outlet for her own rage. 

She heard the first spatter of rain on the windowsill and went out into the garden to gather her linen before it came rushing down.

Miranda liked the rain, she always had. There was something freeing in a storm. For a moment she stood there turning her face upward to the sky, letting the rain fall upon her.

And then finally she went back into the cottage. She folded the linen and put it away. She built up the fire and made her tea. She lit the lantern in the corner, casting out the dark shadows lurking in the room.

At last she settled at the kitchen table with a book and her tea, but the rain kept distracting her. She thought of Thomas again, the way he had held her hand once as they walked through the park, newly engaged. It had started to rain and they had taken shelter underneath a tree, laughing together.

Thomas had kissed her there beneath the tree branches and she had felt the whole of the future unfurling before them then.

_Now._

Now she smoothed her hands over her skirt and turned her attention to her book once more. Perhaps James would return tonight. It had been over two weeks since he was last there. Surely he would come soon. She tried not to dwell on it, the way his absences seemed to grow longer and longer and then when he was there, at times he could hardly look at her as though to do so would remind him of Thomas. Only in the dark could they reach for each other and share their grief.

Her fingers faltered as she turned a page. Would it always be like this? This sharp grief, this interminable longing for the past? She didn’t want to forget Thomas, she would never wish for that, but at times the pain was almost too much. And then she thought of how he must have felt alone in Bedlam and she wanted to shriek aloud with the misery of it. How was any of this fair? How was letting the past die even an option?

She set her book aside and reached instead for a piece of paper and a quill. She would write again to her former servant in London. Surely by now there would be some news, something that would give her hope.

As long as she lived, Miranda knew, she would not rest until Alfred Hamilton had paid for what he had done.

* * *

_Savannah 1710 – Thomas_

They sat in the shade of the sugar maple trees for their midday meal. The sky had grown progressively darker over the morning and so Thomas wasn’t surprised when the rain started at last. He was glad in fact. There would be no more work for today.

He leaned back against the tree and watched the storm roll in. Lightning cracked overhead and the other men started to head back towards the huts. Thomas stayed where he was, lifting his head to smell the distant scent of the sea mixing with the rain.

At times he had almost hated the sea for what it had taken from him. Over the years though he had realized it wasn’t the sea’s fault. It was men, and men alone who were responsible for James and Miranda’s fate. His father, the admiral and his friend.

The ache was still there in his chest when he thought of Peter’s betrayal, but the pain of it was nowhere near the depths of his longing for the two people he loved best in the world. There were nights he could hardly sleep for every time he drifted off, he saw them again. _There in London, in the drawing room, laughing together by the fire. In bed, Miranda tilting her head as James kissed her neck. James coming to greet him when he returned home. Miranda reading late by candlelight, her hair falling down her back as she turned the page._

He would never forget and he would never surrender those memories no matter the pain. The memories were all he had. At times he thought perhaps he was going mad for why else would they stay so bright and vivid in his mind? It was almost as though they were still alive, if only in his own heart.

He was shivering by the time he went back to the hut. The men who shared it with him were gathered around a lantern, sharing tales of the pirates growing bolder and bolder along the coast. 

Thomas rubbed his arms, trying to get warm as he drew closer. When there was a gap in the gathering the conversation he moved nearer, warming his hands by the lantern. The current tale ended and the storyteller looked expectantly around the room.

“What next?”

“Tell us that one about the three navy ships and the pirate captain who sank them all.” Thomas spoke up.

The storyteller’s eyes brightened. “Ah, so it’s Flint you want to hear about.”

“Yes,” Thomas murmured, his eyes on the lantern flame. “Tell me a story about Captain Flint.”


End file.
